


Rain

by wargoddess



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-25
Updated: 2013-05-25
Packaged: 2017-12-12 23:20:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/817239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wargoddess/pseuds/wargoddess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They met in the rain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rain

     They met in the rain.  That was a very romantic sort of thing to say in long retrospect, down the years and from city to city and after the first blush of love had been replaced by the deeper burnish of devotion.  But it was true. 

     Herren was unemployed at the time, and rather unhappy about it, seeing as the end of the month loomed nigh and his landlord was likely to beat him as well as throw him into the street.  He was standing in the Denerim market after hours one rainy night, eyeing the guards and trying not to be too obvious about edging toward the trash bins where the grocers had discarded their unsaleable goods, when he heard someone blubbering.  Not weeping; weeping was a dignified sort of word, completely inappropriate for what Herren heard.  These were full-throated, hitch-and-moan, snot-snorting _bawls_.

     And they did not matter.  In the bin ahead, Herren could see a whole cabbage.  A cabbage!  Probably had a worm in it, but that could be picked out, and he could eat off the remainder for three days.  If he grabbed it now before any of those nimble little elven urchins came along --

     "Nothing," bawled the blubberer, who sounded like a grown man.  "It's worth _nothing_."

     Unimportant.

     "I tried so hard, I really did.  Oh, I should just _die_."

     Void it all.  Curiosity overwhelming hunger, Herren turned and left the worm to its prize.

     He found the voice's blubbering owner standing on the stoop of a building -- one which might have been a shop, but lacked any sort of signage to make this clear.  The man was surprisingly _large_ for someone weeping like an overgrown child:  wide shoulders, massive arms.  And even in the rain, he smelled of hot iron. _Blacksmith_ , Herren thought immediately; he knew the type well, having grown up among them, and having spent most of his life yearning for longer arms and wider shoulders himself.  Yet Herren had stayed small and useless to his smithing family... and yet this man, with his perfect smith's body, stood there with his bald head bowed in defeat.  He clutched something white in his broad hands. 

     The man who stood before the smith, straight and proud and haughty and well-dressed, was saying:  "Now, now, man, there's no need for all that.  Here; I'll give you five sovereigns for it, yes?  Then you need never look at it again."

     "It isn't even _worth_ five," said the blubberer, though he clutched the thing to his chest and half bent over it as if it weighed the earth.  "I should pay _you_ for taking this monstrosity; I'm so sorry."

     And he thrust forward the most amazing scale-armor shirt Herren had ever seen:  each scale delicate and curved and white-pearlescent, the scales themselves so small that the whole garment flexed as easily as cloth.  When Herren edged closer for a better look, he realized he'd heard no jingle in the armor's movement. Its rings must have been small enough to hug the framing-wire, leaving no give in the scales that could lead to loose patches or weak spots.

     "That is _amazing_ ," Herren said, and both men started, looking at him through the falling rain in surprise.  "You must have spent months on it!"

     "A year," said the smith, sniffing.  "I had to turn down three other commissions to get it done.  But now that it's done... oh, _look_ at it!"  He hunched again, as if in physical pain.  "You're completely right, ser; it's _terrible_."

     "Terrible?" asked Herren, incredulous.

     "Terrible," said the well-dressed man, firmly, after throwing Herren a glare.  "Why, the scales are completely uneven, Wade!  I'm going to have to take off a sovereign for that."

     "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

     "Wait just a moment," said Herren, too affronted to worry that he was butting into these strangers' affair.  "You propose to pay this man _four sovereigns_ for armor he spent a year on?  Are you mad?"

     The well-dressed man stared at him for a moment, taken aback.  "Who the Void are you?"

     "His sales agent," Herren snapped, off-the-cuff.  Thankfully the smith just kept staring at him blankly.  "Answer my question, ser."

     "It isn't worth more than that, plainly; he says so himself!"

     "It's worth three lost commissions," snapped Herren, "and time and labor and tears, obviously.  And the stuff those scales are made from -- what is that?  I've never seen anything like it."

     "Narwhal horn," said the smith -- Wade, apparently.  "Such marvelous stuff.  I thought I could do it justice.  I carved each scale individually; wore out three crafting knives and twenty needles.  It cut my hands terribly, and then I had to clean the blood off lest it mar the finish."

     Herren glared at the well-dressed man, who blushed and coughed.  "Well, perhaps seven sovereigns, then."

     "Forty," Herren snapped, "and not a silver less.  It _should_ be fifty."

     "Forty sovereigns?"  The blacksmith blinked at Herren owlishly through the rain.  "Do you really think it's worth that much?"

     "For the Maker's sake, _yes_."  Herren stared at the smith, utterly incredulous.  "How can you not?"

     "Well, the scales might be a little uneven, and there's no jingle or rattle, like Lord Adderly said..."

     "You don't _want_ a jingle or rattle," said Herren, glowering at the well-dressed Lord Adderly.  "Not unless you want your enemies to know you're coming!  And those scales aren't uneven at all.  Are you actually _insulting_ him just to get a better price?"

     Lord Adderly darted a guilty look at Wade, which Herren took to mean _yes_.

     "Fine, then."  Herren marched over and took the scale shirt from the smith's hands.  "You don't want to pay what it's worth?  You don't get it.  Here."  He pushed open the door of the smith's shop and made to throw the scale shirt inside, carelessly.

     "What?" said Wade.

     "What?" said Adderly.  "Wait!"  He was already reaching for his purse.  "Let's, ah, let's not be hasty.  Perhaps thirty sovereigns?"

     Herren glared at him.  "Thirty- _five_."

     So it was settled.

     Wade stood blinking while Herren counted the man's coin and handed him the chain shirt.  As Adderly stomped away through the mud, Herren offered Wade the handful of coins.  Wade just stared at him.  "You actually got thirty-five sovereigns!  But it wasn't worth that."

     "No," Herren said, primly.  "It was worth fifty."  And he picked up Wade's hand and pressed the coin into it.  Then he turned to go, hopefully to find another cabbage if the damned urchins had gotten the one he'd marked earlier.

     "Wait!"  And when Herren turned back, he jumped, for the smith had lunged at him.  But there was nothing threatening in this, because now Wade clutched at his hands, his eyes wide and liquid.  Or perhaps that was the rain.  "Would you like tea?  Um, I might have bread and cheese.  Wait, the cheese has gone off.  Tea and bread?  Something?  Anything?"

     Herren stared at him, then shook his head.  He had no idea what had possessed him to get involved with this obvious madman, but the heroic impulse was gone, and now he had a cabbage to liberate from worm domination.  "Thank you, but no."

     Wade clung like a tick.  "Please, please, you must take this.  I'm no good at haggling.  And you _appreciate_ an _artist_ ; that alone is worth any coin."  And he pressed half the coins back into Herren's hands.  It was more money than Herren had seen in his life, and for a moment he thought: _With this, I can get back on my feet_.

     And yet.

     Herren looked up at the smith, narrowing his eyes.  "Did you really believe that claptrap about that shirt having uneven scales?  Beautiful as it was?"

     The smith looked stunned, and then his great huge shoulders hunched so much that Herren felt the sudden bizarre urge to put his arm around them in comfort.  If he could even get his arm around them.  "Well, yes.  I mean, they _could_ have been uneven, and then when he said it wasn't good I just... I thought..."

     Oh, for the Maker's sake.  Herren sighed and shook water out of his hair, which did no good as the rain just put more in it.  "I think I will take that tea, ser," he said.  "If you don't mind.  And if you'll hear me out, I have a possible business arrangement for you to consider..."

**Author's Note:**

> Just faffing around, and this got too long to post on Tumblr. Always liked these guys, though I probably won't ever do anything more than this with them.


End file.
